


Make Them Fly

by i_am_a_mole_and_i_live_in_a_hole



Category: Thor (Movies), Thor - All Media Types
Genre: Childhood, Dysfunctional Family, Gen, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Kid Loki, Kid Loki and Kid Thor, Kid Thor, Odin's A+ Parenting, Odin's Parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-23
Updated: 2014-04-23
Packaged: 2018-01-20 13:35:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,272
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1512452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/i_am_a_mole_and_i_live_in_a_hole/pseuds/i_am_a_mole_and_i_live_in_a_hole
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While caring for two orphaned raven chicks, Odin thinks about the other orphan he's adopted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Make Them Fly

**Author's Note:**

> This piece was inspired by this video of a baby crow being fed while making the funniest OM NOM NOM NOM noises that I saw making the rounds on Tumblr yesterday: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGBiAMr5HT4

          They were truly ugly little things, the baby ravens his son had rescued, but not unlike his children had been as infants in their noise and their helplessness. And, Odin thought as he leaned over the cleared-out linen chest with a spoonful of finely-minced meat leavings, according to the beast-master, it would be only a matter of weeks until—just like his sons—the little creatures outgrew the need to be fed round the clock and kept in a blanket-lined box under constant care. He would be able to start training them, then—feeding them the apples, teaching them what tidings to bring him from high on the wing. They would be eyes for him, and messengers for Asgard.

          But for now, they were dependent. _Not,_ to his relief, naked—each baby bird bore a thick coat of fluffy down feathers from head to tail. They were feathered sufficiently to keep warm though their flight pinions were still encased in stick-like white tubes, and both were old enough to be fed only once an hour. Little black eyes once sealed over with translucent skin had opened and now blinked up at him, demanding _SQUAWK-SQUAWK-SQUAWKS_ coming from the bright red bulls-eyes of opened beaks to which food was guided. These squawks continued loudly until the ravenous nestlings deemed themselves finished eating, snuggling up against each other with awkward twitches of over-large feet which yet lacked the coordination to grip a hand. Odin had tried, but the chicks fell squawking off of any perch they were given, corroborating Loki’s account of fallen, immobile nestlings.

          And speaking of Loki…

          His second son was peculiar. Intelligent but _shy,_ preferring the company of his mother and girls at a time when most boys would have been vocally shunning anything with the slightest hint of femininity. According to his tutors the boy played with several daughters of the nobility—joining them at games where they imitated having children and running households for their _husbands._ He came up with elaborate stories using their dolls and allowed them to braid and adorn his hair, doing the same for them in turn. He complained vociferously at games where he ran the risk of dirtying his clothes, no matter how many times he was told that it was only natural and wouldn’t be a problem so long as he was cleaned up before being brought to dinner. And just yesterday, Odin had been called down to personally give him a scolding when he’d been caught shirking from the practice field to play a game with some young girl that had involved making dandelion chains and weaving them through each other’s hair and around one another’s wrists.

          _Dandelion chains._

          In consternation, he’d ordered Loki to take them off immediately. The boy had flushed until he was crimson and torn the little yellow flowers from his hair. His mouth had turned slowly downwards until it resembled an upside-down smile under the force of his father’s questions, but he had refused to provide any answers.

          “Answer me, Loki,” Odin had demanded as the boy looked away, twisting slender fingers into the hem of his shirt.

          _“Loki!_ Do you truly think this behavior to be appropriate? You disrespect the swords-master, an honorable man who puts a great deal of effort into training you and your brother. You disrespect your fellow students by forcing your teacher to spend extra time training you outside of regular lessons, thereby allowing him to spend less time training _them._ You disrespect the time and effort that your older brother puts into his lessons, and you disrespect the time, effort, and money your mother and I have put into ensuring that you have the best education possible. Is _that_ what you want?”

          He got no response. Loki, stone-faced and flushing a deep red, still would not look at him. Most of the flowers lay crushed against the flagstones at his son’s feet, but there was one ridiculous, wilted dandelion dangling limply from one of those fancy braids the girl had put in his hair. Odin gritted his teeth. This was too much.

          “I’m just going to have to assume, Loki, that you find your honor to be of less consequence than… than prancing around with flowers in your hair like some sort of catamite.”

          Loki ducked his head, his mouth opening briefly, but stayed quiet.

          “Is that what you are, Loki?”

          The obvious answer was _no—_ Thor would have given him an enraged _NO!_ _Faðir!—_ but this son gave him nothing. A small, dark head bowed lower, and then he heard a little sniffle. But Loki had been out of diapers for _years—_ it was far past the time when he should have been breaking down in tears over a little scolding.

          _“Loki._ Stand up straight and stop crying.”

          His younger son began to cry in earnest at that, hands leaving his sides to clap over a face that had gone as flushed as an infant’s. Then the boy had turned and _run_ , clutching his hands to a grimacing mouth, wholly ignoring shouted commands to return (and why Loki was apparently expecting defiance to _improve_ his father’s disposition, Odin didn’t know), nearly knocking his giggling older brother over backwards as he’d slammed the doors open and gone sprinting away.

          He didn’t understand why the boy had been so… dramatic. Regardless, the behavior would have to be corrected. It was not _seemly_ for a prince of Asgard to put flowers in his hair and dance like some sort of catamite—and far worse for one to raise a hand at his brother and storm away to throw a tantrum while being scolded instead of accepting discipline as a warrior ought.

          If Thor was mercurial and imperious, at least he stood his ground and argued _back_ instead of running away in tears.

          But Loki had good qualities too—if it troubled Odin to think of his younger son petting and kissing and fussing over girls’ dolls, it troubled him far less to see that Loki intuitively possessed enough of a sense of protectiveness to save a pair of grounded nestlings from a scruffy, flea-bitten stable cat and bring them back to his mother. Loki was intelligent beyond his years and showed great promise in his studies… even if his favorite subject just _had_ to be less-than-masculine seidr magic.

          Odin furrowed his brow as he fussed over the nestlings. He just didn’t know how to reach the boy. Perhaps it would do Loki some good to be prohibited from playing with the young girls for a while and sent to sport with Thor and his friends. It might be just what the boy needed to come out of his shell—and develop more  _appropriate_ interests. Frigga had expressed the concern that he might be teased more than he already was by the other boys, yes, but Odin was of the opinion that it was the sort of thing a young boy had to learn to deal with—and if Loki couldn’t stand his ground around his own _brother_ , Odin couldn’t imagine how he would stand his ground against anyone _else._ It might be painful, but sometimes…

          He looked down at the two little nestlings. Inside the box, the larger of the two chicks fluttered its naked wings and tucked its beak over the neck of the other. Neither of them was yet able to pluck dropped food from the ground yet, so Odin picked up the leavings with a soft cloth, swiping at the faded linens beneath as he went.

          Sometimes a fledgling had to be pushed out of the nest in order to fly.

**Author's Note:**

> Find me on tumblr as happygutters (porn, fandom) or mari-the-mole (everything else).


End file.
